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Human Nature Quotes

Browse 4693 quotes about Human Nature.

Human Nature Quotes

“A writer should express criticism and indignation at the dark side of society and the ugliness of human nature, but we should not use one uniform expression.”

Should Humans Use Sides Dark Human Nature Expression Criticism Uniforms Ugliness Dark Side Indignation

Author:Mo Yan

“I also came to see that liberalism's superficial optimism concerning human nature caused it to overlook the fact that reason is darkened by sin. The more I thought about human nature the more I saw how our tragic inclination for sin causes us to use our minds to rationalize our actions. Liberalism failed to see that reason by itself is little more than an instrument to justify man's defensive ways of thinking. Reason, devoid of the purifying power of faith, can never free itself from distortions and rationalizations.”

Source: The Essential Martin Luther King, Jr.:

“Whenever the powers of government are placed in any hands other than those of the community, whether those of one man, of a few, or of several, those principles of human nature which imply that government is at all necessary, imply that those persons will make use of them to defeat the very end for which government exists.”

Men Humans Persons Ends Use Hands Government Community Principles Human Nature Defeat One Man

Book:The Article Government: Reprinted from the Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica

Source: The Article Government: Reprinted from the Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica

“Power tends to corrupt. But the power in Washington resides in Congress, if it wants to use it. It can do anything-it can stop the Vietnam War. It can make its will felt, if it can ever get its act together to do anything.”

“My mother understood human nature better and never chided. She knew that a man cannot be saved from his own foolishness or vice by someone else's efforts or protests, but only by the use of his own will.”

Men Humans Use Mother Effort Human Nature Understood Vices Saved Protest Foolishness

Author:Nikola Tesla

“But the 20th century suffered "two" ideologies that led to genocides. The other one, Marxism, had no use for race, didn't believe in genes and denied that human nature was a meaningful concept. Clearly, it's not an emphasis on genes or evolution that is dangerous. It's the desire to remake humanity by coercive means (eugenics or social engineering) and the belief that humanity advances through a struggle in which superior groups (race or classes) triumph over inferior ones.”

“Anarchists believe that we can govern ourselves in the absence of coercive and centralized authority; the underlying premise about human nature (to use an infinitely problematized but necessary term here) is fundamentally positive. And the evidence that in disasters people are really pretty kind, generous, brave, resourceful and creative fed that.”

People Believe Humans Kind Use Term Creative Human Nature Authority Evidence Brave Absence Disaster Generous Feds Premises Anarchist Resourceful Really Pretty

Author:Rebecca Solnit

“When I went in there, we used drum machine on "Time After Time" and "Human Nature".We don't use the drum machine to play a pattern. You play the pattern by being consistent.”

Humans Play Use Used Human Nature Machines Patterns Consistent

Author:Miles Davis

“The science of the mind can only have for its proper goal the understanding of human nature by every human being, and through its use, brings peace to every human soul.”

Mind Humans Soul Use Understanding Goal Human Beings Human Nature Human Soul

Author:Alfred Adler

“The more I thought about human nature, the more I saw how our tragic inclination for sin/mistakes causes us to use our minds to rationalize our action.”

Mind Humans Use Action Causes Sin Mistake Saws Human Nature Tragic Inclination Our Actions Rationalize

Author:Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Mankind are so much the same, in all times and places, that history informs us of nothing new or strange in this particular. Its chief use is only to discover the constant and universal principles of human nature.”

Humans Use Principles History Mankind Human Nature Particular Strange Universal Constant All Time Chiefs Us History Nothing New

Book:An inquiry concerning human understanding. A dissertation on the passions. An inquiry concerning the principles of morals. The natural history of religion

Source: An inquiry concerning human understanding. A dissertation on the passions. An inquiry concerning the principles of morals. The natural history of religion

“Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen - but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present.”

Men Giving Use Hands Mother House Politics Causes Fire Wife Human Nature Fallen Urges Rescue Moderation Moderates Disobedience Alarms Babe Uncompromising

Author:William Lloyd Garrison

“Some tools of thought are so blunt that they are almost useless; others are so sharp that they are dangerous. But the wise man will have the use of both kinds.”

Men Kind Use Wise Dangerous Human Nature Tools Useless Blunt

Author:Gregory Bateson

“I believe that the basic nature of human beings is gentle and compassionate. It is therefore in our own interest to encourage that nature, to make it live within us, to leave room for it to develop. If on the contrary we use violence, it is as if we voluntarily obstruct the positive side of human nature and prevent its evolution.”

Ifs Believe Humans Use I Believe Sides Interest Human Beings Rooms Healing Violence Human Nature Evolution Conflict Contrary Gentle Compassionate Conflict Resolution Conflict Of Interest

Author:Dalai Lama

“Because many advances have happened, we've lost the urgency (and that's just human nature) that we had before, when we couldn't vote, couldn't use mass transportation, or drink from the fountains.”

Humans Use Lost Happened Human Nature Drink Mass Vote Fountain Urgency Transportation

Author:Spike Lee

“The defects of human nature afford us opportunities of exercising our philosophy, the best employment of our virtues. If all men were righteous, all hearts true and frank and loyal, what use would our virtues be?”

Ifs Men Humans Heart Philosophy Use Opportunity Virtue Human Nature Exercise Faults Employment Loyal Righteous Frank Defects

Author:Moliere